Four More Years

At this point, enough of the votes are in that it’s safe to call it. The American people want President Obama to serve a second term.

Read that last part again. He was voted in, fair and square. There wasn’t some liberal media conspiracy. There’s no more elusive birth certificate silliness this time around. Simply put, the voters spoke.

If that’s not good enough, and you just have to blame someone, I’ve got an apt candidate: the Tea Party.

Two years ago, I looked back on the wretched farce that was the 2010 midterm election and noted that the Tea Party was able to win seats. The question, however, was whether or not they could govern. The answer turns out to be a resounding no. Sure, they played it well for the fans back home by nipping at the President’s heels at every turn, but let’s discuss their actual achievements.

Anybody? Nope. I’ve got nothing.

Public perception of them was skeptical at best, especially following (what was at the time) the most expensive election in history. They set themselves up as a bunch of strident contrarians, but that only works so long. For some reason, they chose to play brinksmanship on the debt ceiling in 2011, culminating in threats of a government shutdown if they didn’t get their way.

That backfired for Gingrich in 1995, and it backfired in 2011. If you were listening to anybody besides Hannity or O’Reilly, you’d have noticed the dramatic shift in public opinion to the negative. Not only had they forked the Republican party at a time it desperately needed unity, their actions left a stigma on the party as a whole.

This wasn’t helped by the fact that their pet Presidential candidates were far-right hyper-religious types guaranteed to intimidate moderates and independents. By the time Romney stepped through the dust cloud to gain the nomination, it was obvious that even his own party wasn’t too keen on him as a candidate.

All they had to do was not screw up, but they couldn’t even manage that. So here we are: four more years of gridlock.